Easter feaster

The fridge's be-clingfilmed bounty is the result of the Easter holiday. A few days at home in which to pick up some nice cheese from the terrific people at Neal's Yard, or choose a shoulder of lamb and then spend an afternoon prepping the roast. Things I don't have time for on a workaday week.

There was even time for a full-on clean of the flat, which always makes me want to stay at home and cook! With the flat finally unpacked, then, I make an Easter-themed Easter Monday roast for friends: eggs, spring lamb and chocolate.


Quail's eggs with celery salt
I boiled the eggs for two minutes then dashed cold water over them, about 5 minutes before eating so they were hard boiled, and still slightly warm. They were so beautiful that I kept them in their shell and just put out a little dish of celery salt to dip them in, once shelled. Prosecco is the only way to wash anything down, I'm beginning to think, so opened a bottle to go alongside.

A shoulder of lamb
...roasted up beautifully, flavoured with anchovies, rosemary and garlic - a la Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's 'Weeping lamb'. There wasn't a terrific amount of fat in the joint, but all the same it anointed the potatoes, carrots and onion beneath it, gifting them its flavour. For some reason I was every bit as excited about the cabbage (sort of steamily-fried in butter and a dab of water, lid-on) which was lovely and bitter.

Cheese I think we had a snip of cheese at this point, after our customary debate about whether to have it before, or after, dessert.

Chocolate fondant pudding, so often the graveyard of Masterchef contestants, didn't look hopeful at the start: after adding the melted chocolate the mix seized up, turning stiff and unfriendly. I was determined to make the attempt though, so forced the mix into the chi chi pastel ramekins gifted to me from Mrs I., covered them in clingfilm and deserted them in the fridge.

At this point I still hadn't tested the oven for baking (old, but new to me) however somehow the culinary gods smiled, and later that evening, after 10 minutes in a hot oven, they turned out perfectly. No, really, absolutely PERFECTLY. They were so rich and so soft in the centre, that I finally understood why they are called 'fondants' and was very surprised to find we could only manage one each. We had a dash of single cream to go with it, but that was more than enough.

The 'spare' chocolate pots were useful to experiment on, and I can report back that they were fine the next day, even, just cooked from the fridge again. The last I froze and had a week later. I would recommend defrosting it before cooking, although you would have had the smarts to do this automatically. I cooked it from frozen and it took about 40 ridiculous long minutes. But was still gorgeous.

I digress: I only had to finish by saying we surprised ourselves by having a postprandial cocktail - an 'Old fashioned'. A strong, caramel-tasting broad, and just the ticket.

My Mother likes a photo best of all, but I'm afraid I was (as often) too busy eating to remember the camera. So instead, here is my lunch the next day. Cold lamb and radicchio pitta, quails egg and cheese.